Jim Gardiner Was Never Qualified to Teach Special Education
A central claim to Alderman Gardiner’s biographical story is that he is was an educator. Specifically, he has claimed on multiple occasions that he was a Special Education teacher at Curie High School.
However according to documentation from Chicago Public Schools (CPS) and the Illinois State Board of Education (ISBE), that does not appear to be true…
Jim Gardiner’s Special Education Claim
“I decided to work with the most at-risk students by becoming a Special Education teacher at Curie High School”
Jim Gardiner’s Brief and Sporadic History as a CPS Teacher
Note: All the red bars = “not teaching”. Gardiner taught full time fewer than two years, had a stint as a sub teacher 2010-2013 and then subbed 14 days as he geared up to run for political office.
CPS Documents Prove Jim Gardiner is Lying
Documentation from CPS and ISBE demonstrate these basic facts about Jim Gardiner’s teaching credentials:
He was a full-time CPS teacher for only two school years, 2003 to 2005.
He taught Special Ed at De La Cruz for one year without being certified to teach Special Education.
In order to teach Special Education at De La Cruz in 2003, he requested an emergency certificate from ISBE based on his claim that he was taking coursework to become certified. There is no evidence that he ever pursued such certification or enrolled in any educational program. The ISBE ultimately declined to issue an exemption, presumably due to his failure to obtain a valid certificate, meaning he was no longer able to teach Special Education after the 2003-2004 school year.
In 2004, Gardiner transferred to Curie High School. It’s clearly documented by CPS and ISBE that he was a History teacher and had no certification to teach Special Education.
In 2005, when applying to the Chicago Fire Department, he clearly stated that he taught Social Studies at Curie. He made no claim that he taught Special Education at Curie until running for public office.
Jim Gardiner’s Personnel File from Chicago Public Schools
On August 27, 2003,Gardiner applies to be a Special Education Teacher at De La Cruz.
The De La Cruz Principal sends a request to ISBE requesting a short-term emergency certification to be able to teach Special Ed - meaning he obviously had no such certification and this was clearly conditional on Gardiner’s claim that he was currently enrolled in a Special Education program - which appears to be false.
In response to an inquiry this year as to Gardiner’s certification status, ISBE responded:
“James M. Gardiner applied for a Type 12 – Short Term Emergency Special Education Certificate on 9/3/03. It was never issued.”
Gardiner officially started at the Fire Academy on 5/2/2005, meaning he didn’t complete his second year as a full-time teacher.
On November 3, 2005, Gardiner registered to join the Substitute Teacher Pool. Note he incorrectly listed having a Special Education Endorsement, which he did not have.
Gardiner worked in the Substitute Teacher Pool sporadically between 2010 and 2018. He subbed 9 days at Steinmetz in 2010. All other sub days were at Taft.
It’s unclear why on his CPS application, Gardiner omitted that he attended University of Northern Colorado in Greeley, CO for a single year, which appears on his CFD application.
On September 30, 2003, ISBE informed Gardiner that his short-term emergency certification could not be processed due to incomplete information about his training.
On August 18, 2004, after one year at De La Cruz, Gardiner transferred to Curie Metro HS. Note next to his name, it’s clearly indicated that he was hired to teach History, not Special Education.
On June 10, 2005, James Gardiner was notified by CPS that he was being laid off as a full-time teacher. Note at the bottom, his only endorsement is History — no Special Education.
There is not a single record regarding his employment at Curie that indicates he taught Special Education.
Here, again, Illinois State Board of Education records indicate that he was never certified to teach Special Ed, only Civics, Sociology, Social Science, and History. This also demonstrates that he allowed his only remaining license to teach lapse in 2015, meaning CPS failed in their duty and allowed a teacher without a currently registered license to substitute teach for years after it lapsed.
Finally, in his own words, when applying to CFD in December 2004, while currently teaching at Curie, Gardiner made no mention of teaching Special Education.
It wasn’t until he decided to run for public office in 2018 that he made this a central claim.